14nm delivers substantial gains

On February 14, Samsung announced that its new 14nm Exynos 7 Octa processor entered a volume production. When compared to Samsung’s planar 20nm technology, this new process enables up to 20 percent higher performance, 35 percent lower power consumption and an overall productivity gain of 30 percent. Bear in mind that the Galaxy S5 has a 28nm Snapdragon 801, not a 20nm Exynos, and that the performance and efficiency gap should be even wider.

T-Mobile Austria was one of the few places helped us find out a bit more about the processor. There were no big surprises. The site lists it as Exynos 7420 (14nm) (64-bit, A57 2.1G Quad + A53 1.5G Quad). In a sense the basic specification and the choice of cores puts this CPU very close to the Snapdragon 810 processor, but it's a different story in the GPU and modem department.

The Snapdragon 810 also supports native 64-bit and has four Cortex-A57 cores at 2.0GHz and four Cortex-A53 cores at 1.5GHz, but it is a planar 20nm chip. This means that head-to-head the Exynos 7420 should end up faster, while at the same time delivering superior battery life. We have to wait for some real-world tests to see the efficiency gains in action, but initial benchmarks look very promising indeed. Another thing to consider is throttling. The Snapdragon 810 suffers from aggressive throttling on the LG Flex 2, but thanks to the more advanced process, the Exynos should cope with extended load somewhat better. While the official max clock is just 100MHz on the Exynos, the processor should be able to sustain it for much longer periods of time.

Exynos 7420 and in-house Cat 6 modem

Perhaps the most surprising part of the new platform is the modem. Samsung hasn’t gone on record about the modem, but according Sammobile it should be using model SS333, or Exynos Modem 333, an in-house modem. Samsung only tells the press that it is using a Cat. 6 LTE modem.

This modem can achieve speeds of 300Mbits, making it more than capable of offering a great internet experience. Cat 6 enables the Galaxy S6 to connect to two spectrums at once, aggregating both to give faster download speeds. The iPhone 6 supports LTE Category 4, offering up to 150Mbps downlink data rates and 50Mbps uplink speeds.

Qualcomm has an LTE Cat.10 capable modem to offer up to 450 Mbps downlink via 3x carrier aggregation and up to 100Mbps uplink using 2x aggregation, but most carriers simply don’t have the infrastructure to support it, at least not yet.

There is no doubt that from the hardware perspective the Galaxy S6 has the most advanced processor in the market, leaning heavily on using the world's first mobile 14nm SoC and reaping many advantages of this new process, while Qualcomm and the rest of the competition just started 20nm manufacturing and sales. That said, 2015 will be interesting year to watch in the mobile space, as FinFET becomes an option for high end SoCs and 28nm becomes even cheaper, allowing manufacturers to use more powerful chips in entry level devices.

As for 20nm, it will still be around, but with limited capacity and higher costs than 28nm, it does not have much of a future.

While some of the first devices based on the Snapdragon 810 are about to hit the global market, Qualcomm has decided to unveil some the first details regarding its next big thing at Mobile World Congress 2015 in Barcelona, the Snapdragon 820 SoC.

Although it did not unveil a lot of details during its keynote at MWC 2015, the company did say that the Snapdragon 820 will be built on a FinFET manufacturing process, so it is either TSMC's 16nm or Samsung's 14nm node.

Qualcomm also noted that the Snapdragon 820 SoC will be part of its new Zeroth platform and feature the first with 64-bit custom Qualcomm ARMv8 CPU core, named the Kyro.

While Qualcomm was unwilling to shed any more specific details regarding that custom Qualcomm CPU core, or the GPU part for that matter, it did say that first samples are expected sometime in the second half of this year.

Samsung has carried out its purge of in-house apps on the Galaxy S6 and included some of Microsoft's software. Both the S6 and S6 edge will ship with a "Microsoft Apps" folder that currently includes OneDrive, OneNote and Skype.

It does not seem that Samsung has extended this offer to Office, but who the hell wants office on a mobile phone anyway? More useful is the 115GB of free OneDrive cloud storage for two years. This means you can snap your pictures and store them on the cloud.

All this appears to be the direct result of Microsoft and Samsung calling a truce in their Android royalty dispute.

Both sides win really. Microsoft's services get a lot more exposure now that they are included in phone bundles rather than having to be searched.

Samsung has just officially announced the Samsung Galaxy S6 and Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge phones. Both phones share the same DNA and the only difference is that the S6 Edge has a dual-side curved screen.

Samsung is finally done making plastic flagships, so a new metal and Gorilla Glass 4 design debuts with this generation, and we have to admit that this is the best looking Samsung Galaxy S ever. In the process Samsung has killed off removable battery, as well as the microSD expansion slot. We can live without a removable battery, but we think that ditching microSD is lame move, since many Samsung fans are quite fond of expandable storage.

14nm Exynos, LPDDR4, faster storage

The phone is powered by an eight-core 64-bit Exynos processor that should offer 20 percent higher performance than the 20nm Exynos 5433 in the Note 4. At the same time, the new 14nm octa-core should also offer 35 percent lower power consumption. Four out of eight cores works at 2.1GHz, and the remaining four work at 1.5GHz. The phones come with 3GB RAM, but that's not all.

Samsung is using LPDDR4 memory, as well as Universal Storage 2.0 that is a bridge technology between SSD and eMMC storage. The universal storage uses less power too, while offering superior storage performance. LPDDR4 should end up about 60 percent faster than previous DDR3-class chips.

The display is a 5.1-Quad HD, 2560x1440 Super AMOLED with 577 ppi and the main difference is that the screen pm the Edge version is warped at the edges. The S6 has 77 percent more pixels than the S5 and Samsung rolled out a new Galaxy Gear VR virtual reality set too. The set is compabile with both phones.

Since the screen is smaller than on the Note 4, you get an 11-percent increase in pixel density, and this should boost display quality on the new Gear VR.

Supercharged battery and new f/1.9 cameras

Samsung claims that its enhanced processor offers 12 hours on battery life on wireless, 11 hours on LTE, 13 hours watching movies and 49 hours of music playback. When it comes to charging, Samsung also claims faster than any battery in the industry today. The company said that it takes only 10 minutes to get enough power for an additional 4 hours of everyday use. The Galaxy S6 charges from 0 to 100 percent in half as much time as the iPhone 6. Sounds impressive, but let's wait and see.

The battery is built in, and so is the Wireless charging that supports both WPC and PMA standards. The phone is 6.8 millimetres thick and the 16-megapixel camera can record 4K. The camera protrudes out of the body, but there are a few redeeming features, such as a speedy f/1.9 aperture, optical image stabilisation (OIS), as well as some cool camera software features. The front-facing 5-megapixel camera also features a fast f/1.9 lens, but that's not all. Pixel count is not everything - the camera uses a 43 percent bigger sensor. Coupled with the faster lens, the sensor captures much better images in low light. The same goes for the main camera, as it delivers superior quality compared to previous Galaxy models, and the iPhone 6 Plus.

As usual, TouchWiz sits on top of Android 5.0 Lollipop, but the Samsung skin has been redesigned and looks better, but we only saw what Samsung wanted to show us. It looks like a major TouchWiz overhaul, but we need to see more. The curved screen S6 Edge is not just for show, as it offers fast access to contacts and other functions, and a few other nifty features.

The phone comes in 32GB, 64GB and 128GB and it will be available in 20 countries on the April 10th slightly less than six weeks from now. Both phones looks better than the S5, but it's really the hardware that stands out. If Samsung prices the phones at normal rate, both could be a huge success. We do like the Samsung Pay, that sounds like something that can by popular among other Android users too.

Samsung has finally introduced the Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge phones that will bring Samsung Pay mobile payments to America and Korea this summer.

You may say it's yet another mobile payments solution, but Samsung Pay is actually compatible with most existing POS terminals around the world. All you will have to do is unlock your phone via the fingerprint and then tap a credit / debit card reader. It should be as simple as that.

Samsung Pay is using new technology called Magnetic Secure Transmission (MST). This is the reason why Samsung acquired LoopPay, as the MST technology tricks old terminals into believing that you swiped an actual card. This will look fun if you try it out with merchants that don't know about MST, as it will look like you hacked the terminal. However, this may be the biggest game changer in mobile payments.

Samsung claims that this is the best mobile payments solution to date, as it will work anywhere, since it does not need new NFC terminals. Samsung has partnered with Master Card, Visa, American Express, Bank of America, Chase, Citi, US bank, First Data and more companies. Samsung Pay will go live this summer in Korea and the US.

The product looks very interesting indeed, and it might bring the mobile payments to mainstream users, unlike Apple Pay which is limited in terms of hardware. The fact that Samsung uses both NFC and the MST might help make mobile payment more popular and boost adoption. Of course, it will work only with Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge devices, at least for now.

Recently Samsung announced that serial production of its new 14nm SoC has already commenced. The new part is going to end up in Samsung Galaxy S6 and a few other devices.

This happens less than two quarters after Intel started production of Broadwell-Y 14nm CPUs, its first 14nm volume manufactured part.

Intel has yet to introduce mobile phone and tablet SoC based on Braswell / Airmont, on the new 14nm manufacturing process, and Intel has the best manufacturing fabs in the world. A new manufacturing process like 14nm costs billions of dollars to deploy, and Intel is the only company that can do it on its own.

The rest of the market needs TSMC, GlobalFoundries and other foundries to handle manufacturing for their SoC/GPU/CPU designs. The fact that TSMC and GlobalFoundries could not get 20nm ready for more than two years really hampered innovation. Samsung had some of its own Exynox SoCs in 20nm, but this was far from being significant in the big scheme of things.

The transition from 28nm to 20nm manufacturing should result in a 20-percent performance increase and 35-percent less battery drain, but this process came very late. Transistors are simply smaller and need less power to work.

The GPU industry will skip 20nm simply as yields were horrible with high performance parts such as GPUs. Apple had better luck with 20nm A8 SoC that ended up performing well in tens of millions phones and tablets around the world, but only in very late 2014. The 20nm manufacturing process was supposed to happen at least a year earlier, but it got delayed due to yield-related problems.

The fact that Samsung goes 14nm before Apple and even before Intel in SoC phone space is a big statement. Samsung got good 14nm yields, as it is confident enough trusts it with its flagship Samsung Galaxy S6 phone. This means that it should be able to produce millions of Galaxy 6 phones based on 14nm Exynos 7420 SoC.

The 14nm process should boost performance and reduce power consumption, but since 20nm was almost nonexistent for Android phones in 2014, we will compare this process with 28nm SoCs like the Snapdragon 801.

Samsung’s 14nm SoC could end up close to 40 percent faster compared to 28nm SoCs and could enable battery life that is close to 50 percent better. This is a huge leap forward and currently Samsung will be the only beneficiary to this technology. The advantages are obvious - you don't need a 3000mAh battery on a flagship phone based on 14nm silicon, they can be lighter and thinner.

For years Samsung had the same hardware like all the rest of the high end market. Qualcomm was the king until 2015 with its high end SoCs. Samsung Galaxy 5, HTC One M8 and LG G3 all had Snapdragon 801 and there well little difference between the performance that could mostly be attributed to Android customisations like Samsung TouchWiz, HTC Sense or LG's own interface.

This time Samsung can have better SoC, while it remains to be seen if Samsung will use Apple’s approach and still decide to use Qualcomm's LTE external modem chip. Qualcomm, MediaTek and companies that became (were) irrelevant to phones like Nvidia and Intel should have their 14nm / 16nm SoCs in 2016.

This doesn’t mean that Apple and Samsung will get to 10nm next year, as this is simply not realistic, but 14nm might give Samsung an edge. We expect the first phone SoCs based on 10nm in 2017 at best. Samsung has to play the software card well, as TouchWiz was one of the big complaints for its phones.

The fact that LG wants to make its own SoC means that if you want to remain in the top league, you will have to make your own SoC like Apple, and Samsung. The question remains - does the investment in design and manufacturing of a SoC pay off? It is a huge risk for anyone, and getting well designed and safe chips from companies like Qualcomm definitely saves you a lot of money. Let’s see how good will Exynos 7420 really be against Snapdragon 810 – 20nm, and the rest of the competition.

Samsung has announced an updated version of its Exynos 7 Octa processor. Last year it announced a 64-bit, ARMv8 processor based on a 20nm design, but these new chips will be 14nm processors.

The big news is that Samsung says mass production of the first chips developed with a 14nm FinFET process is underway. It looks like the Exynos 7 Octa processor will be the first to see the shift from 20nm to 14nm. Samsung says the technology will be used in additional products later in 2015.

This could be good news in terms of efficiency and performance. Samsung says the new chips could be up to 20 percent faster while using 35 percent less power. Thing better performance and longer battery life.

Intel's Broadwell chips are also based on 14nm designs. But those processors are designed for desktops, notebooks, and tablets, while Samsung's ARM-based chips are aimed at mobile devices, primarily smartphones.

Like we said last week, Samsung has beaten Intel, Apple and Qualcomm in the race for the first 14nm phone SoC – and now it's in mass production to boot. We are just weeks away from Samsung shipping the Exynos 7 inside the Galaxy S6.

Fudzilla has found out that the Samsung Galaxy S6 will be one of the first devices to boast a non-Intel chip build around a 14nm process.

The Exynos 7420 SoC will be a 14nm octa-core, with four Cortex-A57 cores and four slower Cortex-A53 cores. Most of the chips coming in 2015 will use ARM's big.LITTLE approach, but in 20nm. Samsung Exynos 7420 is 14nm and is also using Mali-T760 GPU. We have the manufacturing node confirmed by multiple sources but you only need to wait for the March 1 to see the official announcement at the Mobile World Congress Galaxy S6 launch event.

Qualcomm's Snapdragon 810 was the main candidate for the Galaxy S6, since Qualcomm has the best LTE modem on the market. However, Samsung pulled out from using the chip, sparking rumours that it was overheating. However it turns out that Samsung is simply happier with what it had in-house, and therefore decided to use the Exynos 7420 14nm octa-core instead. There is a chance that Samsung might use an external chip from Qualcomm, just as Apple does for iPhones.

The fact that Exynos 7420 SoC is 14nm means a few things. Samsung / GlobalFoundries 14nm manufacturing is in better shape than most people expected, as the Galaxy 6 is expected to sell in tens of millions of units this year. This is not some risk production 14nm for a low-volume phone that will sell in hundreds of thousands. Samsung trust its manufacturing capabilities with its best-selling, flagship phone.

Samsung is beating both Apple and Intel to market with a smartphone 14nm SoC. Apple is expected to use 14nm A8 with the new iPhone / iPads, but this traditionally happens in September / October. We expect to see Intel 14nm SoC showcased at Mobile World Congress but we are not sure who will use it. Intel had trouble getting high profile mobile phone manufactures interested in its smartphone technology.

From what we can see in early benchmarks, the 14nm Exynos 7420 won't be much faster than the 20nm Exynos 5433 predecessor in any tests except in 3D. It turns out that you can expect more than 20 percent faster graphics and significantly faster runtime test in AnTuTu. The 14nm SoC should be good in terms of battery life too, as 14nm should need 35 percent less energy to work at the same clocks. Samsung is promising that its 14nm LPE (Low Power Enhanced) manufacturing process can give some 20 percent of performance increase compared to 20nm SoCs.

The 2015 will be an interesting year for phones as Samsung has a new weapon and the rest of the industry has to rely on Snapdragon 810 or MediaTek processors for 2015 performance and high end phones.

Samsung has announced that it is now mass producing Embedded Package on Package (ePoP) memory, which greatly increases density and efficiency.

A single ePoP module includes 3GB of LPDDR3 DRAM and 32GB of eMMC storage, along with a controller. The module is thin (1.4mm) and small, with a significantly smaller PCB footprint than current two-package eMCP memory solutions.

Samsung’s new ePoP takes up 225 square millimetres (15x15mm), just like the mobile application processor. The currently used PoP also measures 15mm x 15mm, but it consists of the mobile processor and DRAM - eMMC is housed in a separate 11.5mm x 13mm package, so the whole platform takes up 374.5 square millimetres. Samsung said ePoP decreases the total area used by approximately 40 percent.

Baek said Samsung plans to expand its line-up of ePoP memory with packages involving enhancements in performance and density over the next few years, with a focus on the high-end market.

However, a similar approach can be used in a wide range of mobile devices. Samsung already offers a single-package solution for wearables (like the Apple S1 module). The technology could also be used in tablets and other devices.

Nvidia appears to be the latest chip designer to use Samsung’s and GlobalFoundries’ 14nm node. The company won’t be alone, as the same node will be used by Apple, Qualcomm, AMD and of course Samsung.

According to Business Korea, the new node will go online in the second quarter of 2015. Apple, Qualcomm and Nvidia will be among the first outfits to use it, aside from Samsung. Samsung could lead the way with the first 14nm ARM SoC in the upcoming Galaxy S6, but this is still speculation and nothing is confirmed.

A Samsung official told the publication that 20nm is already a “mainstream technology” and that rivals are trying to compete with 16nm FinFET, but Samsung is in an advantage.

“Our company has already introduced the production process of 14 nm FinFETs,” the unnamed Samsung source told Business Korea.

Qualcomm is using TSMC’s planar 20nm node for its latest Snapdragon 810 flagship SoC and the chip seems to be experiencing some thermal issues, although Qualcomm is playing them down.

As for Nvidia, its first FinFET product should be Parker, a SoC based on the company’s custom 64-bit Denver core and Maxwell GPU.